WHEELING — Winter has officially arrived, and although a serious blast of winter weather has not yet been felt in the city of Wheeling, crews will be prepared to tackle whatever Mother Nature brings this season.

New equipment that was on back order for more than a year is finally arriving in the Wheeling Operations Department. This includes four new snow removal trucks for the fleet, complete with salt spreaders and snow blades.

Following the COVID-19 pandemic, municipalities across the nation were flooded with federal pandemic relief money. Eligible uses for these funds included purchases of emergency service vehicles and other community related equipment, and the long list of orders to outfit municipal vehicles resulted in a significant backlog to receive newly purchased ambulances, firetrucks and other equipment.

The city of Wheeling utilized general fund monies to purchase the new vehicles as part of a permitted reimbursable expense, Wheeling City Manager Robert Herron explained. Because of the backlog, it has taken well over a year to get the order fulfilled.

“Two years ago, city council ordered four new dump trucks for Operations that included snow plows and salt spreaders,” Herron said, noting that two of the new trucks were delivered, and two more were in Zanesville getting the salt spreaders and snow plows installed.

“We anticipate having those here within the next several weeks,” he said. “So it’s taken a while to get these vehicles, but fortunately, we’re going to have the two and hopefully all four before we have to do a significant snow plow event this winter.”

This week, one of the new Ford Super Duty trucks was in the garage at the Wheeling Operations headquarters in Clator getting city decals applied.

Anthony Peace, superintendent of the city of Wheeling’s Vehicle Maintenance Department, said the fleet will be prepared when weather comes.

“We’re going to be ready,” Peace said. “We have the old trucks still in place ready to go with spreaders on them. We will have these (new trucks) ready in a few weeks.”

There were still a few things to button up on the first arrivals before they hit the roads, but it won’t be long, Peace noted.

“We’re pretty excited,” he said. “We’re going to have plenty of snow equipment. I hope we don’t have to use it, but if we do, we’ll be ready.”

According to the city manager, the old vehicles that the new dump trucks are replacing will still be utilized in different roles in the fleet.

“Actually, one of them is going to be used in Sanitation, and the others are still in good enough condition that we can use them as backups,” Herron said.

The new trucks have aluminum bodies and stainless steel spreaders, so they will not rust, officials noted. After winter is over, the new dump trucks can be used for other work by the Operations Department.

“The delivery of these four vehicles is going to really put the Operations Department in a good spot, equipment wise,” Herron told Wheeling City Council members. “Things are really going in the right direction from the operations equipment perspective.”

Another new snow-related purchase made recently will specifically target clearing snow from the top levels of city parking garages.

During the last city council meeting of the calendar year, officials approved the purchase of a new Kubota snow removal plow and broom from Lashley Tractor Sales of St. Clairsville. The city is using money from the city’s parking garage fund line item for the $45,327 purchase.

Council followed Herron’s recommendation to expedite the purchase by holding two readings of the ordinance during the last meeting.

“Obviously, snow is coming our way,” Herron told council members. “If you recall, council approved doing a full-deck repair of the top deck of the 10th Street Parking Structure. That work has been completed. Part of the deterioration that can occur is when it snows, it’s using a metal blade on that surface. So this will enable us to use a broom instead of a blade for most of our snows. Obviously, if we get a major snow storm, we’ll have to plow it. But for the vast majority of the snows we get, we’ll be able to broom the top levels of the 10th Street Garage, the new Market Street Parking Structure and the Intermodal.”

Herron said the purchase of the broom to remove snow from the top levels of the parking garages was specifically recommended by Carl Walker Construction, the company that built the new Market Street Parking Garage and a firm that is considered an industry specialist.

For deeper snow, a plow blade with a rubber edge can be used on the top level of parking structures to avoid causing damage to the deck, officials said.

Herron noted that aside from the new snow removal equipment, the Operations Department also acquired a new skid steer device, a front-end loader and a leaf machine recently, adding to a strong fleet of equipment to serve the community.